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8 July 2011

How Brooks tried to destroy the Guardian

How is this phone hacking thing going to end? Rebekah Brooks: "With Alan Rusbridger on his knees, be

By Duncan Robinson

Rebekah Brooks said that the phone-hacking scandal would end with Guardian editor “Alan Rusbridger on his knees, begging for mercy”, according to Nick Davies in this week’s Media Talk podcast over at the Guardian. Davies continues: “They would have destroyed us. If they could have done, they would have shut down the Guardian.”

Elsewhere in the podcast, Rusbridger talks about the resistence to covering the scandal from within Fleet Street. “I was told from time to time that this was not helpful for Fleet Street,” said Rusbridger. “The only thing that was going to damage Fleet Street was the failure to deal with this seriously. If the PCC had acted in 2009. . . then I think the News of the World would still be alive.”

The general gist of the podcast is: “Ha, ha, we were right!” You can hardly blame them. People who should know better repeatedly told the Guardian that they were on a hiding to nothing, and yet we are now staring at a scandal that has brought down Britain’s most read newspaper, revealed widespread corruption in the police and shaken the Prime Minister. The Guardian deserves its moment in the sun.

Listen to the whole podcast here.

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